Patient Care

Facts about Anesthesiology and Anesthesiologists

Anesthesiology is the practice of medicine dedicated to the relief of pain, and the total care of the surgical patient before, during, and after surgery. Try to imagine today's health care without surgery. It's almost impossible. Now try to imagine surgery without anesthesia. Equally impossible. Without anesthesia, many of modern medicine's greatest benefits simply would not exist. More than 25 million surgical procedures are performed each year in the United States. Clearly, the health and well being of almost everyone you know has been touched by the science of anesthesiology, and the skill and dedication of your anesthesiologist.

Many people think of their anesthesiologist as the “doctor behind the mask” who helps them sleep through surgery without pain, and who wakes them up when their surgery is over. The anesthesiologist is the perioperative physician (“peri-” meaning “all-around”) who provides medical care to each patient throughout his or her surgical experience. This includes evaluating the patient before surgery (preoperative), consulting with the surgeon, providing pain control and monitoring life functions during surgery (intraoperative), supervising care after surgery (postoperative), and medically discharging the patient from the recovery unit. Your anesthesiologist makes informed medical judgments to control the patient's pain and level of unconsciousness, and to make conditions ideal for a safe and successful surgery.

The education of today's anesthesiologists has kept pace with their expanding role in offering the highest quality health care available anywhere in the world. After completing a four-year college program and four years of medical school, they enter a four-year anesthesiology residency-training program. Fellowships in an anesthesia subspecialty involve an additional year of study. Reflecting the anesthesiologists' commitment to the specialty and their educational background, complications from anesthesia have declined dramatically over the last 30 years. All this has occurred during a time when the youngest of premature infants in neonatal units survives intricate, lifesaving procedures; and at the same time, 100-year-old patients successfully undergo major surgeries that were once thought to be impossible.

Today's new safe, short-acting anesthetic medications and sophisticated monitoring devices enable anesthesiologists to provide their patients with the most up-to-date and best medical care possible on a daily basis.

For more information about anesthesiology, please visit the web site of the American Society of Anesthesiologists.